Calgary won't escape spring snow forecast to slam Alberta
Much of Alberta is forecast to see some snow this week, and Calgary is not going to escape the winter-like weather.
Fingers-crossed that you still have your winter coats handy, because it’s going to get chilly and snowy soon in our city.
Daily Hive spoke to Terri Lang, a meteorologist with Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC), regarding how much snow Calgary could see over the coming days.
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Sure, the weather is going to turn pretty gross in Calgary over the coming days, but there is a glimmer of hope. Lang says that the Calgary area will not be seeing as much snow as other parts of Alberta, due to being south and west of the main system impacting the Prairies.
The system causing all the spring snow in the Prairies is due to what meteorlogists call a Montana low, which forms in that U.S. state and usually travels east and gets out of the Prairies in typically a day or two.
This one, however, is taking somewhat of a “funny path,” taking a bit of a left turn, up through Manitoba and kind of circling back. Lang says that kind of keeps the low-pressure system with all the snow, cloud and everything kind of still rotating around it through the Prairie provinces for a couple of days, and that’s why there’s so much accumulation forecast for places further east than Alberta.
Calgarians should expect to get some flurry activity late on Friday, and maybe a couple of centimetres of snow worth there. With the warm temperatures and the warm ground, Lang also added that lots of the snow that does land will likely melt in short order.
Calgary forecast
Environment and Climate Change Canada
According to ECCC, the average high for Calgary around this time of year is 13°C, while the average low is zero.
Other parts of Alberta will surely see a larger impact from this system, and if you love spring snow, head to places closer to the Saskatchewan-Manitoba border. Areas like Cold Lake and Fort McMurray will probably get snowfall amounts in the 20 to 25 centimetre range, but there will be some melting there, too.
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If you think having snow this late in the year in Calgary is a bit out of the ordinary, Lang added it’s pretty expected.
“I think it’s pretty typical, just because of the volatility of the weather in April is pretty well-known in Alberta. It’s just a fact that there are big temperature swings, and then snow back in,” Lang said.
“And that has to do with the fact that there’s still cold air to the south, but the warm air is trying to make its way up, so there’s sort of this ongoing battle.”